e ends of justice. For if he took the highly indignant
line, and it were proved after all that one of his boys was involved in
the scrape, how foolish he would look!

"And you really mean to have this boy up before Mr Elliot on a charge
of poaching?" he asked.

"What else can I do?" said Lord Woodruff. "His own obstinacy in
refusing to tell what he knows is to blame."

"But supposing that he really knows nothing, how can he tell it? I know
the boy well, and he is remarkably truthful and straightforward.
Intensely interested, too, in the studies and sports of his school, and
the very last to seek low company or get into a scrape of this kind."

Lord Woodruff smiled and shook his head.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE.

Have you ever stood near a bee-hive when something unusual was going on
inside? When a swarm was meditated, or you had cut off the
communication with a super which you meant to take? Just such a buzz
and murmur as then arises might have been heard in Weston court-yard
when the boys poured out from the schools, only increased so much in
volume as the human vocal organs are more powerful than the apiarian.
And surely not without cause, for the scene which had just been enacted,
without any rehearsal, for their benefit was simply astounding.

"Fancy Tom Buller the chief of a gang of poachers!" cried Saurin. "By
Jove, I did not think it was in him, and fairly confess that I have not
done him justice. He is a dark horse and no mistake."

"Why, you don't for a moment suppose that there is anything in it, do
you?" asked Robarts, who heard him.

"I don't know, I'm sure," replied Saurin; "perhaps not. Awful liars
those keeper chaps, no doubt. We shall know all about it in time, I
suppose."

"It would not be bad fun if one got a fair price for the game one took,"
said Griffiths. "But the risk and difficulty of selling it would be so
great that one would be certain to be robbed."

"What an ass Tom Bowling was to give himself up; it would have been all
right if he had sat still."

"I don't know that. He had already been caught breaking out of college,
don't you see, and they would have been certain to put this and that
together."

"Who would?"

"Old Jolliffe."

"Not a bit of it. I twigged his face when Buller stood up, and he
looked as vexed as possible. _He'd_ never have told."

"I am not sure of that, and I think Buller was right not to risk it."

"Fussy old chap, Lo